


Blood in the Water

by turduckenail



Series: Blood in the Water [2]
Category: The Little Mermaid (1989), The Little Mermaid - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ariel is a feral witch in this one, Ariel's moral compass is a roulette wheel, Background Character Death, Body Horror, Eventual Happy Ending, F/M, Gen, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Politics, Rating May Change, Slow Burn, i'll clean these up tomorrow, it's like 11 pm i can't think of the tags i should have
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-27
Updated: 2020-08-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:08:41
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26135518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/turduckenail/pseuds/turduckenail
Summary: There are things sleeping in the ocean, in the deep and the dark. Things that were never meant to see the light of day. That doesn't stop one of them from reaching for the stars anyway.---Ariel shows her teeth in this one.
Relationships: Ariel & Ursula (Disney), Ariel/Eric (Disney)
Series: Blood in the Water [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1776403
Comments: 19
Kudos: 37





	Blood in the Water

**Author's Note:**

> “&  
> so  
> she did  
> what any  
> rational woman  
> would do—  
> ever so calmly,  
> she reached out  
> & she tore  
> the stars  
> apart.”
> 
> ― Amanda Lovelace, "The Mermaid's Voice Returns in This One"

The moon was waxing gibbous. Only days away from turning full, and already so bright it almost hurt to look at. It turned the sea beneath it to liquid mercury and cast the black horizon into stark relief.

And below — far, far below, where the moonlight couldn’t reach — Atlantica was making preparations for a celebration.

It was the twenty-first birthday of King Triton’s youngest daughter. More importantly, it was the twenty-first anniversary of the day she had been taken from them. The day she would finally be returned to them to take her rightful place in the city of her birth. A hero-princess in her father’s court. A legend made flesh, the crown jewel of the royal bloodline.

Children begged their parents for the story of the youngest princess, who were all too happy to oblige. It’s such an important occasion, after all, and the children should know what it’s all about.

‘She sacrificed herself to save the queen’s life, you know,’ they would start the story. They mostly ignored the fact that she had been a newborn at the time. After all, a heroic sacrifice is a heroic sacrifice, and a hero without any agency doesn’t make for a very good story.

Inside the palace, the stories were a little different.

“She was such a cute little guppy. Red hair, even brighter than her mother’s. Prettiest shade you ever did see.”

“Oh, but she cried like you wouldn’t believe. A strong voice, that one. I wonder if she sings now?”

The royal family didn’t take part in the storytelling.

Alana spent a lot of her time flitting from the kitchens to the gardens to the concert hall and back, checking and double-checking that everything was still on schedule. They only got one chance to make a good first impression on her little sister. Everything had to be perfect, and all of Atlantica was working to make sure that’s exactly what it would be.

There would be a grand parade to escort her from the outskirts of the city to the castle, bedecked in gold and jewels, trailing banners and singing a song of triumphant return. There would be a feast in the castle that was planned to last a full week or more, and a festival held in the streets that would last at least twice as long. There would be artisans, the most skilled in the ocean, all coming to present masterpiece after masterpiece as a welcoming gift to the youngest princess. Sebastian, Father’s favourite conductor, would conduct a symphony written in honour of the occasion. Alana and all of her sisters would be singing in it and had been practicing for months in advance.

The city - the whole ocean - was trembling in excitement.

Or, well, most of the ocean anyway.

The atmosphere inside the castle was just as excited, but there was a tension tangled in with it. A worried edge to the servants’ smiles, glances traded as they passed in the halls as if they were looking for reassurance from each other. This was good, right? This was something to be excited about, not to dread, right?

Her sisters seemed oblivious, or willfully ignorant. They thought it wasn’t anything to be worried about, just nerves about making sure everything was as perfect as it could be. Alana had always had sharp eyes though. She saw what her sisters refused to recognize. She saw the anxious strain around her father’s smile, she saw the dark worry haunting her mother’s eyes. She saw it, and she didn’t understand why it was there at all, but she didn’t know what to do about it, so she had let it be.

Tonight though, with the waxing gibbous moon drawing close to full, she couldn’t help but feel the tension, drawing taut enough to snap.

It was late. She should have been in bed. She’d been in rehearsals from dawn till nearly midnight and she was exhausted but she still couldn’t sleep. Then she’d seen her father’s shadow pass by her room in the wee hours of the morning and had given up on sleep entirely.

She knew it was probably nothing. Father was just as restless and excited as everyone else. Alana had no reason to think him being awake at this hour meant anything at all. She should really just stay and try to get some sleep, pretend she hadn’t seen anything.

She drifted out of her room after him anyway.

The castle never slept these days, there was always some number of servants working late or getting an early start on the ongoing preparations, but the wing that housed the royal family was quiet at this hour. The shadows were thick and heavy, though the walls rippled blue with watery light. Alana didn’t know what compelled her to keep out of sight, but she kept to those shadows, blanketed from sight as she trailed quietly after her father, keeping several lengths behind him to avoid being caught. She would just follow him long enough to make sure nothing was wrong, then she would turn around and go back to bed.

Father found Mother draped in the curve of a windowsill, looking out at the dark waters, shot through with moonlight filtering down from the surface. She sat entirely still, her face as blank and unflinching as if it had been carved from marble, and didn’t turn to look when Triton entered the room. Alana didn’t know what to make of the crease between her eyebrows, nor the shadows in her eyes.

“Athena,” Triton spoke into the silence.

“Husband,” Athena replied.

“It’s late, my love,” said Triton quietly, moving to rest a gentle hand on Athena’s shoulder. “Why are you still awake? Come back to bed.”

Athena still didn’t turn to look at him but rested a hand over his. She said nothing.

Alana couldn’t see his face from where she lingered behind the doorframe, but she was sure he frowned. “Is something the matter?”

Athena heaved a sigh. “You know what’s the matter, Triton.”

“I don’t, truly,” Triton traced the back of his hand over Athena’s jaw, fond and worried. “Talk to me, please.”

Still, Athena didn’t speak, and the silence hung heavy in the shadows. The water felt suffocating with the same tension that had been poisoning the castle for weeks, and Alana almost turned back. Whatever this conversation was, it wasn’t meant for her to hear. She really should leave.

Her mother’s voice was tired when she finally spoke. “You’re a fool, Triton.”

“Athena-”

“You’re a damned fool.”

“Why?” he snapped. “Am I a fool for loving you? For doing everything in my power to protect you? Should I have let you die while there was something I could do to stop it?”

“Yes.”

Athena’s voice was barely audible in the wake of Triton’s anger, but it silenced him as effectively as if she had stolen his voice entirely. Alana couldn’t have moved from her hiding place if she had wanted to.

It was a long, heavy moment before Triton spoke again. “Athena…” His voice fractured around the word as if it took all the strength in his being to say it without breaking apart entirely.

Athena’s expression softened a fraction. “Do not mistake me, husband. I never —” She huffed in frustration after a moment of struggling with the words, giving up on whatever she had been about to say. “I am glad to still be here. But the price I paid for it was too high. You should not have traded Ariel’s life for mine.”

“I didn’t— Athena, I swear to you, I didn’t. Ursula is a trickster and a con artist, but she has never gone back on a deal, and she said that no harm would come to Ariel.” He reached out to gently cup her jaw. “I promise you, Ariel will come back to us.”

Athena tangled her fingers with Triton’s where they rested against her face. Alana strained her ears to hear the rest of the conversation.

“For both of our sakes, I hope you’re right. Because if you’re wrong, if you truly have sent my daughter to her death,” Athena finally turned to look at Triton, and Alana saw teeth and fury in her eyes, “then I will never forgive you.”

—

Perseus was having a very good day. In fact he’d go so far as to say he was happier than he’d ever been in his life. His scrawny shoulders had finally filled out, he was married to the love of his life, and they’d welcomed their first child into the world just a month ago. Even putting aside the upcoming festival, it was hard not to be happy. He found himself smiling constantly, completely incapable of not being incandescent with his joy.

Yes, he thought gladly, things are finally looking up.

The witch found him in a ravine a few miles from the city.

She was veiled in black, a cloud of something that was either fabric or ink and billowed in the current around her. Her tail curled dark green behind her, a mould she spread in her wake. Her fingers were long and bone-white, sharp and pointed like ribs, the only bright part of her.

He couldn’t see her face, but he knew her mouth to be full of shark teeth.

Perseus swallowed, it made his throat click. He bowed his head as much as he could without taking his eyes off of her.

The witch inclined her head in response. “Perseus,” she said in a pretty voice. “You look well. Has my magic given you what you asked for?”

“Y-yes ma’am,” he said with a voice that only shook a little.

He couldn’t see her face, but she seemed to smile. “That is good to hear. You are healthy? Your friends respect you?”

“Yes ma’am.”

“And you are loved by your wife? Is she as beautiful as you had hoped?”

Perseus smiled despite himself. “Yes. Yes, she’s the most beautiful and kind mer in all the seas.”

“And your son? Is he healthy and strong as you wanted?”

“Yes, madam witch. He’s — he’s wonderful, I love him so much.”

The witch inclined her head again. “That is good. I’m glad.”

For a moment, Perseus believed her.

Then she spoke again. “Bring him to me.”

He froze. “I— what?”

The witch was very still, in the way a predator is very still in the moment before it bites. “That is what we agreed. I’ve fulfilled my end of the deal,” she said in that same pretty voice. “Now fulfill yours.”

Someone choked on a sound. It took Perseus a moment to realize it was him. He felt like he’d been stabbed. He was shaking his head before he could stop himself.

“No?” said the witch, seeming more curious than anything. “You won’t fulfill your end of the bargain?”

“He— You— I can’t—”

“Can’t you?”

Perseus felt himself sink to the ground. He was shaking. “Please. Please, not my son. Anything but my son. I’ll give— I’ll give you anything just please, please don’t take my son.”

The witch floated before him, impassive and terrible. “Anything, you say?”

He bowed his head further. His eyes were burning, he could feel his heart battering against his lungs. “Please.”

The witch was silent for a moment, for an age. Then, gently, “Alright.”

Perseus saw her hand move, and his world was consumed by yellow light.

—

The polyp shuddered in the sand, tiny and wretched in its fear. Ariel plucked it up, cradling it gently in her hands. She ran a bone-white nail over its head and watched it quake harder. She hummed with no real feeling behind the sound and tucked the polyp into her satchel. She was a bit more pleased with this outcome than if Perseus had decided to cooperate. She had no idea what she would have done with a child.

She probably would have turned it into a polyp anyway. This way she was saved the hassle of waiting for Perseus to fetch it.

The water here was cold and moonlit, and open in all directions above the ravine. Ariel took a moment to luxuriate in it, coiling lazily through the water and watching the light play patterns on her scales. She drank deeply of it, felt the water sit cold and heavy in her lungs, then twisted around all at once and set off in the direction she’d come from, warm in the knowledge of a job well done.

**Author's Note:**

> THANK YOU FOR YOUR PATIENCE OH MY GOD IT ONLY TOOK ME 5 MONTHS.
> 
> This chapter is kinda rough cause I haven't done a proper round of editing on it yet but I really wanted to get it up asap. I'll come back with a polished version in a couple of days tho. :)
> 
> For reasons that we're all aware of, I haven't been at my best creatively this year so writing has been Slow. I promise this fic is still my baby though and I'm committed to seeing it through even if it takes way longer than it should for me to update lol. Thanks for everyone who stuck with me through my hiatus while I figured out where the heck this fic is going (spoilers it's going Very Good Places if everything pans out the way I want it to). 
> 
> Your comments have meant the world to me, even if I've been terrible at replying to all of them I read Every Single One and they always make my entire week. You guys are amazing.
> 
> I love you, I hope you're well, and I'll see y'all with the next chapter soon!


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